welcoming the Hero

They induced labor in the hospital by breaking my waters. Labor was going beautifully and easily, naturally. We had a dark room, music, no interventions, not even an IV. The children had taken over the waiting room and Grandma had arrived to care for them. We had the promise of the hospital staff that one of the baby's parents would be in physical contact with him from the moment of birth until we left the hospital. I was laboring standing up, the way I wanted to do so. It began to get very intense. I assumed I was hitting transition. My partner's wife, my girlfriend, brought two-year-old Storyteller in to me and he pretended to labor like me, laying his head down on the bed and breathing open-mouthed. It became more and more difficult to get oxygen. A cold sweat came over me. I couldn't feel my legs. My lips vibrated. I grasped my partner's finger, "I feel like I'm going to have a seizure," I told him.

Then I heard a voice saying that I wasn't going to give birth after all. I was so relieved, I woke up. There were nurses and people everywhere. Someone was trying to get me to sign a consent to have a c-section, telling me all the ways I could die during it.

Then I was in the operating room and it was too bright. They pulled me away from my partner but I tried not to let go. They put a mask over my face, and I couldn't breathe at all. I thought of five-year-old Scientist. I passed out.

Then I couldn't open my eyes at all. I blinked and saw a dark red earth baby in my partner's arms, straight black hair all over his head. I assumed this was my son. His father said, "He's not a Zen." I couldn't move or keep my eyes open but I could speak, so I said, "pain," because I was in a great deal, and I was wondering if they could give me something for it so I could hold the baby. "Don't you want to see the baby?" someone said. I could see the baby from where I was. I kept trying to keep my eyes open but it didn't work. I was glad that I could hear their voices, glad to know everyone was there. I heard the eight-year-old Gamer, my partner, my grandma; I wanted to hear the Storyteller, Scientist, the Biggest Brother, but I passed out again instead.

Then I was being transferred to a new bed, which hurt quite a bit, which was a preview of the inability to move I'd feel for days. And that was when I first had my baby, took him from my partner, possessed him consciously. He wasn't a Zen. He was Manawyddan. But my partner didn't like it. So I said, "[the Hero's real name]."

And that was it. Peter - a family name, something normal to fall back on. [His real name] - my partner said, "he's my earth child," and he is ruddy, and I craved dirt while pregnant with him. [His unique-enough-to-find-him-by-Google-if-I-type-it middle name] - because I said, "but he's my moon child, a son of mothers and womanly things." We call him [his real name].

He is an unobtrusive baby, trusting, never crying, nursing and sleeping on whatever schedule I care to impose. He likes his sling, his brothers, and breastmilk. He's changing everything.